Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 1.djvu/191

"Do you know how they return again?" "No Sir," he replied.
"Do you know where the path of Devas and the path of the fathers diverge?" "No, Sir," he replied.

3. "Do you know why that world[1] never becomes full?" "No, Sir," he replied.
"Do you know why in the fifth libation water is called Man[2]?" "No, Sir," he replied.

4. "Then why did you say (you had been) instructed? How could anybody who did not know these things say that he had been instructed?" Then the boy went back sorrowful to the place of his father, and said: "Though you had not instructed me, Sir, you said you had instructed me.

5. That fellow of a Râganya asked me five questions, and I could not answer one of them." The father said: "As you have told me these questions of his, I do not know any one of them[3]. If I knew these questions, how should I not have told you[4]?

6. Then Gautama went to the kings place, and when he had come to him, the king offered him proper respect. In the morning the king went out on his way to the assembly[5]. The king said to him:

↑Or, according to others, why the water has a human voice; purushavâkah in Brih. Âr. XIV, 9, 3.

↑I doubt whether the elliptical construction of these sentences is properly filled out by the commentator. In the Brihadâranyaka the construction is much easier. "You know me well enough to know that whatever I know, I told you."

↑I read avedishyam, though both the text and commentary give avadishyam. Still viditavân asmi points to an original avedishyam, and a parallel passage, VI, 1, 7, confirms this emendation.